In recent years, attention is paid to printing systems using terminal devices that communicate directly with printers (image forming apparatuses) to perform print operation by the printers. The terminal device of this print system automatically searches for compatible printers which are connected to the same network as the terminal device so that print operation can be performed without need for installing driver software in the terminal device. For example, AirPrint developed by Apple Inc. and Google Cloud Print developed by Google Inc. provide environment to configure terminal devices to implement the above-mentioned printing systems.
In this type of printing systems, the terminal devices and the printers make use of a standard network protocol (telecommunication rule or communication procedure) such as Bonjour. The terminal device discovers appropriate printers by multicasting an inquiry to printers on the same network and requiring each printer to return information about capabilities (file formats) which can be handled by the each printer. When each printer returns a capability notification in response to this inquiry, the terminal device determines if the printer has the capability for the required purpose of the terminal device, and reflects the capability notification in the search result to be displayed. The user refers to this search result and select one printer to perform printing. In accordance with this method, it is possible to discover printers not only of a particular printer manufacturer but also of a variety of printer manufacturers.
Incidentally, for example, Japanese Patent Published Application No. H4-321189 discloses a portable electronic apparatus supporting different types of communication protocols. This apparatus is provided with a storing mechanism for storing a plurality of communication protocols, and an enable mechanism for enabling a predetermined communication protocol from among the plurality of communication protocols stored in the storing mechanism. The portable electronic apparatus communicates with an external device by the use of the communication protocol which is enabled by this enable mechanism.
Incidentally, while the printing system as described above provides an environment where printing is made possible for terminal devices in which are implemented various functions (AirPrint, Google Cloud Print or the like), sometimes on the printer side a certain function (a function of a terminal device) is disabled. For example, there are needs for having a terminal device recognize the printer as a printer compatible with a certain function but recognize the printer as a printer incompatible with another function.
However, since these functions implemented in terminal devices uses the same communication protocol, the printing system cannot determine which function transmits a capability inquiry so that it is impossible to enable/disable each of the functions independently.
In view of the above, one or more embodiments of the invention may provide an image processing apparatus, a method of controlling the same and a non-transitory computer readable recording medium which can disable a particular one of functions which are implemented using the same communication protocol.